Bob Bowen reentered the office, closed the door, set his chair against
it, and sat down. Then he regarded the surprised and frowning
“broker.”
Mr. Henderson was a man to be seen once and remembered. He had a large
nose, thin slits of black hawk-eyes, shaggy black brows, and a thin
red line of mouth under a closed-clipped mustache. An able man, a
forceful man, an unscrupulous man, this confidential agent of the
magnate Dickover! Bowen, however, did not appear to be much impressed.
“You wonder why I’m sitting against the door, Mr. Henderson?” he
drawled, chewing at his cigar. “For the obvious reason. To keep you
from getting out.”
Henderson stiffened. He was startled and taken aback. But Bowen
continued his drawl without observing the agitation of the impeccably
dressed agent.
“There’s silver,” he ruminated, “and silver. Bar-silver used to be
forty-seven; now it’s over ninety and still climbing. A low-grade ore
that cost eight dollars a ton to produce a few months ago and gave
back eight dollars, was no good. Now, however, it gives back eight
dollars’ profit and is a paying proposition. Those claims I sold you
are that kind.
“Some day, and I guess it isn’t very far off, folks are going to
discover a chemical process that will take a zinc-silver ore and
separate the zinc and the silver. An ore of that kind to-day, isn’t
worth a tinker’s dam. If that chemical process is discovered, it will
be worth millions. And tucked up in my sleeve I’ve got a property just
like that.”
Henderson rose impressively.
“See here, Bowen,” he observed, “I don’t see what you’re driving at,
but if you mean that I can’t leave this room—”
“You can leave it pretty quick,” drawled Bowen. “But remember one
thing! I’d like nothing better than to mix it with you! I’m just
itching to hold you in a corner and pound off that big nose of yours;
so don’t start anything unless you want me to finish it.”
“What do you mean talking to me like that?” snarled Henderson angrily.
“A moment ago you sold me two claims, and now—”
“And now, having concluded business before pleasure, I’m talking. Miss
Ferguson has transferred her block of Apex Crown to me.”
Henderson’s eyes narrowed. He started to speak, and bit back the
words.
“That’s right, don’t get hasty,” and Bowen grinned exasperatingly.
“Took you by surprise, did it? Thought I didn’t know you, eh? Well, I
had sort of figured out that you might be you, and when you stepped in
the door I knew it _was_ you. Picking up low-grade silver properties,
are you? I don’t suppose that by any stretch of friendship you’d tell
me why you’re picking them up?”
Henderson’s face went livid with anger.
“So you cut in ahead of me!” he rasped. “You got that little fool of a
girl to hand over the stock—”
“Just one minute, Henderson!” Bowen lifted his hand. “I’ve got a
terrible temper. It doesn’t work very hard, not every day; but to hear
names and epithets applied to honest women is something that sets it
on a hair-trigger. Now, if I were you, Henderson, I’d just speak names
and leave out the adjectives. Do you get me? Get me right off the
jump?”
Henderson swallowed hard. It was plain to see that he was seething
internally. But he knew men; that was his business. He looked into
Bowen’s gray eyes, and controlled himself.
“What do you want?” he said slowly, his voice low and tense. “What are
you driving at? Trying to force a bigger price for that stock out of
me?”
“Nope,” returned Bowen cheerfully. “But it isn’t nice for a big man
like you to come in here and try to threaten and browbeat a girl into
giving away all she’s got in the world. It’s going to get you badly
beaten up one of these days. However, now that you’re dealing with me
you might prove reasonable. How much will you give for that Apex
Crown?”
“Thirty,” growled Henderson.
“Buyin’ for Dickover or yourself?” asked Bowen softly.
The agent uttered a lurid curse. Bowen rose and kicked away his chair,
and opened the door.
“I thought so,” he remarked cheerfully. “Well, I guess that check’s
cashed, so I’ll mosey along. You needn’t wait here for Miss Ferguson;
she won’t be back for quite a spell. And don’t come down in my
elevator; wait till I’m out of the way. And say—when you do come, shut
the door after you, will you? So-long.”
Bowen closed the door softly and strode off to the elevator. On the
way down, he glanced at his watch. It was nine fifty.
“Lots of time,” he thought. “I’ll see Dickover, then meet the little
lady.”
At two minutes before the hour he inquired at the desk for Dickover,
and was sent up to the latter’s suite. He found Dickover declaiming to
a private secretary, who admitted him and then retired discreetly. Bob
Bowen dropped into a chair beside Dickover’s table and accepted the
cigar shoved at him.
“I like your cigars,” he observed pleasantly. “The flavor is a little
strong for my taste, but it’s real tobacco. And then the label is
pretty. Don’t know when I’ve ever seen a prettier one—”
“Confound you!” snapped the fat man. “What d’ you know?”
“Well, I’m thirty years old, pretty near, and you’d be surprised to
find how much I’ve learned in the last decade of that time! Experience
is—”
“Damn your experience!” exploded Dickover. “Do you know who’s buying
Apex Crown?”
“Of course. Don’t you?”
For answer, Dickover seized a check from the table and held it out. It
was for five hundred dollars.
“Thanks.” Bowen stuffed it carelessly into his pocket. “Since seeing
you this morning I’ve become fairly rich, and this will add a trifle
to the pile. Your agent, Henderson, is the man after Apex Crown. Just
offered thirty for the stock I hold.”
The fat features of Dickover purpled with anger. But he suppressed his
emotion, drew another cigar from his pocket, and lighted it.
“I rather suspected it, Bowen,” he squeaked more calmly. “Of course
you didn’t sell him the stock?”
“No. I’ll sell it to you if you want it.”
“Huh! How much you want?”
“Five dollars a share.”
Dickover abandoned the subject, after an apoplectic choke.
“Tell you what, Bowen; that tip of yours sent me up to Tonopah in a
hurry. I looked up Henderson and fired him—fired him good and hard.
The confounded crook! Now I need another man to take his place. A man
I can trust, and a man who can be trusted. Ten thousand a year if the
man makes good.”
“Too bad you didn’t look around at Tonopah,” said Bowen innocently. “I
know heaps of good men up that way. You should have gone to Judge
Lyman or Tom Jerkens or some of those men and had ’em pick you out a
nice responsible party for that job. They know everybody up there.
Where do you get these cigars? Think I’ll buy me a box.”
Dickover smoked for a moment in silence. Then he laughed.
“I did snoop around up there, Bowen,” he remarked at last. “What kind
of a cuss are you? This morning you couldn’t pay your hotel bill; and
now you turn down a ten-thousand-dollar job!”
Bob Bowen sighed.
“Well, I do say that it’s tempting. It’s just that, Dickover. But now
I’ve got responsibilities, such as that Apex Crown stock.”
“Huh! Well, you know those mines you told me about—the Sunburst and
the Golden Lode? I looked ’em up in Tonopah. How much you want for ’em
both?”
Bowen looked up, genuinely startled. “You want to _buy_?”
“Uhuh. If the price is right.”
Bowen grinned. “Say, this is pretty rich! Listen here. An hour ago I
was talking with Henderson, and talking soft. Somehow he got the
notion that you were waiting here to buy those two claims off me.
Savvy? He jumps into the breach with five thousand, which is now mine.
The claims are his—”
Dickover purpled with indignation.
“You sold out to him; that dirty yellow dog? What the jumping devils
do you mean by it? Why didn’t you sell to me—”
“Now, you just pour some ice-water over your scalp and cool off.”
Bowen’s long, lean forefinger shot out at him. “How the jumping devils
did I know you wanted to buy those claims? How did I know you wanted
_any_ low-grade stuff? In yesterday’s paper you said you did _not_
want it—you’ve never touched it before—”
Dickover waved his hand in helpless resignation.
“Oh, shut up, Bowen! Let me think, will you?”
For a space the two men smoked in silence. Dickover’s fat features
were tensed in frowning thought. To Bowen but one thing was patent:
the magnate was now after low-grade silver ores. If he had not sold
those two claims to Henderson in such a hurry! He had certainly been
hoist with his own petard that time!
The thought made him chuckle. At the sound, Dickover began to speak
slowly.
“Bowen, you say you want five dollars for that Apex Crown? Now, I’ll
speak frankly. Apex Crown will be worth five dollars—but not for a few
years. For the past week my men have been secretly buying it in at two
cents; and now I want that block of yours. That or nothing! I’ll offer
you par, one dollar, for that stock. If you refuse, I’ll wash my hands
of the whole mess and throw what I’ve bought on the market at the
present price. Speak quick! If I take the mine, it goes up in value.
If I don’t take it, it’s dead.”
Bowen stared at his cigar.
He did not doubt that Dickover was in earnest. And suddenly a light
broke upon him. It was vague and foggy, but it was light.
“See here!” He leaned forward earnestly. “I’ll put this Apex Crown
offer up to my friend—she’s a lady. I’ll go to my own room and call
her up. In the mean time, you get Tonopah over long-distance. Anybody
there you’d trust down to the ground?”
Dickover, eying him, nodded. “Judge Lyman is my local attorney there
and is one of the best men I know in the world.”
“That goes for me. Well, you want low-grade ores of big body and
zinc-silver mixture; same as the Apex Crown and Sunburst and Golden
Lode, eh? All right. Now, I’ve had an ace up my sleeve for some years.
I’ve called it the Big Bony, and it’s located down Rhyolite way. The
ore runs zinc-silver strong, just like these others; only Big Bony has
it in large quantities.
“Until about ten minutes ago, Dickover, that group of claims was not
worth a cuss. To you, if my guess is right, it’s now worth all the
money I need in my business—say thirty thousand dollars. Judge Lyman
knows all about it; has had assayers report on it, has visited the
place himself with me, and owns a bunch of claims the other side of
it. You call up Lyman before I come back.”
“Yes?” prompted Dickover as Bowen paused. The magnate was keen-eyed,
attentive.
“That ore, I believe, is what you want. It’s really worth a big bunch
more than thirty thousand; but I’m needing thirty thousand bad, right
now! Will you buy it at that?”
Dickover reached for the desk telephone. “I’ll talk to Lyman. His word
is good for all the money I own.”
“Good! I’ll be back pretty soon.”
Bob Bowen sought his own room and requested the office to page Miss
Ferguson, who was somewhere about the parlors.
While waiting, he strode up and down savagely. Ten thousand dollars
meant a fortune to this girl! If the offer was rejected, Dickover
would carry out his word and flood the market with Apex Crown. Sooner
than make Henderson rich, he would smash Apex Crown and Henderson
together.
The telephone jingled. Bowen caught up the receiver and heard Miss
Ferguson’s voice.
“This is Bob Bowen speaking, Miss Ferguson. I’ll be down in a few
minutes. Dickover has made me an offer of ten thousand for your stock,
and I want your advice.”
He heard the girl’s voice catch. “Ten—ten thousand!”
“Yep. What I want to know is this: Do you want me to play safe on this
stock or do you want me to handle it as I would my own? I warn you,
there’s a vast difference between the two! I can’t warn you too
seriously.”
She did not reply at once. Bowen waited until waiting grew
intolerable.
“Hello! Are you there, Miss Ferguson?”
“Yes. I—I was thinking. Please, Mr. Bowen, handle that stock entirely
as if it were your own. I’ll take the chance!”
“Good! Thank Heaven for your courage! I’ll be down presently.”
He had quite forgotten the five thousand which she bore for him.
Bowen returned to Dickover’s rooms in no great haste; talking with
Tonopah would take time as well as money. But when he entered, he
found Dickover giving his private secretary some instructions. “And
rush the papers here!” concluded the magnate. “With witnesses.”
“Well?” Bowen dropped into a chair, as if casually. “Did you get Lyman
yet?”
“The boy’s making out the papers now. I’ll buy. What did your lady
friend say?”
Bowen felt a trickle of sweat run down his back. The game was
won—almost!
“One thing at a time,” he said, laughing. “Let’s clean the Big Bony
off the slate, then clean off the Apex Crown.”
“Uhuh. One thing I meant to tell you, Bowen. Keep your eye peeled for
Henderson! That fellow is bad medicine when he’s crossed, and I judge
by your manner that you have crossed him some this morning.”
“I did, I hope,” Bowen chuckled. The magnate grunted non-committally.
In ten minutes the ownership of the Big Bony group of claims was
transferred from Bob Bowen to Dickover. The secretary and witnesses
departed. Bowen pocketed the magnate’s check for thirty thousand
dollars.
“You lost another thirty on that deal,” said Dickover complacently.
“I’ll clean up fifty with the thirty I got,” retorted Bowen. The other
chuckled.
“I’ll gamble that you do, at that! Well, about the Apex Crown—”
“We hang on to it.”
The eyes of the two men met and held for a long moment.
“Then,” Dickover’s fist crashed down on the table, “you’ll go smash!
All or nothing is my motto. In three days you won’t get three cents
for that stock—and what’s more, you never will get three cents for
it!”
Bowen rose, his lips curving in a smile.
“Maybe. Well, I’m glad to ’ve met you. Hope we meet again.”
“Same here.” The two men shook hands. Dickover extended another cigar.
“Smoke up on me after lunch, Bowen. Sorry you’re going smash with that
block of Apex Crown!”
“I’ll be sorry if I do,” said Bowen cryptically. “So-long!”